Goodbye 2011 !! (What got my attention this year ?)

As we say good bye to this incredible year (2011) and welcome the new year (2012) it is time to look upon some of the important highlights of the passing year. I have made this list of events for the year 2011 keeping into consideration the events of relevant importance. I might have missed a lots of things as I only tend to care about stuff that I like. So in nutshell this list might not be the perfect list for everyone but it sure will be fun to read. I’ve tried to include most of the important events from the field of politics, economics, technology, social networking, personal and of course the incredible world of cinema and the movies that I saw. Hope you all like it and find it informational.

So here we go:

Jan 11th – Verizon announces iPhone on their network  and started selling the phone in February.
Jan 23rd – Political revolution started in Egypt and spread across other middle-east countries (Libya, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia)


Feb - Nothing much happened that got my attention. I might be sleeping for the whole month. Moving on.


Mar 2nd – Apple introduces iPad2 with lots of new features and slimmer design.
Mar 11th – iPad2 goes live ; 8.9 magnitude earthquake hit Japan (5th strongest since 1900)
Mar 20th – AT&T proposes to buy T-mobile for $39 billion (will becomes #1 US wireless carrier post-merger)


April 4th – Larry Page took the responsibility as Google’s CEO
April 28th – Apple introduces the White iPhone
April 29th – I ran my 1st 5K of 2011 – Illinois Marathon (This is my First 5K ever) – Champaign, IL


May 2nd – Osama Bin Laden killed by the US Navy Seals
May 10th – Microsoft buys Skype for $8.5 billion in cash
May 19th – IPO of LinkedIn – Target open price $45 per share, planning to sell 7.8 million share on its first day and will raise around $352 million.
May 24th – IPO of Yandex (Russia’s answer to Google)


June 4th – My 2nd 5K run of 2011 – Tuscola, IL
June 6th – Apple unveils iOS 5, iCloud and MAC OS X Lion at WWDC 2011
June 16th – IBM completed 100 years in business
June 28th – Google launches Google+ and joined the war against Facebook


July 1st – Watched Transformers 3
July 4th – My 3rd 5K run of 2011 – Champaign, IL
July 20th – OS X Lion released


Aug 4th – Dow loses 512.76 point (4.31% down), NASDAQ loses 136.68 points (5.08% down), S&P500 loses 60.27 points (4.78% down) – Worst day for the market since Dec 2008
Aug 5th – S&P downgraded the US debt rating to AA+ from AAA
Aug 6th – Watched Rise of the Planet of the Apes
Aug 8th – S&P downgraded the debt rating for mortgage finance giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to AA+
Aug 8th - Dow loses 634.76 point (5.55% down), NASDAQ loses 174.72 points (6.09% down), S&P500 loses 79.92 points (6.66% down) – Another very bad day for the market since Dec 2008
Aug 9th – Apple overtakes Exxon Mobil for the first time to become the most valuable public company (in any field of business).
Aug 10th – Another bad day for the market. DOW sheds 519.83 point, NASDAQ loses 101.47 point and S&P loses 51.77 point.
Aug 10th – At the close of the market, Apple ahead of Exxon Mobil for the first time ever and became the most valuable company in the world.
Aug 15th - Google decided to acquire Motorola Mobility for $40.00 per share in cash, or a total of about $12.5 billion.
Aug 18th – HP decided to abandon WebOS, and confirm its plan to spin off PC business.
Aug 24th – Steve Jobs stepped down as Apple’s CEO. Tim Cook became new Apple CEO
Aug 25th – Linux OS turned 20


Sep 6th – Yahoo board fired CEO Carol Bartz.
Sep 9th – Watched Warrior
Sep 12th – I got the First position in the company wide innovation challenge – Task 1
Sep 13th – Another first position in the company wide innovation challenge for Task 2, plus a 2nd position in Task 3
Sep 13th – Microsoft introduces new Windows 8 (beta) platform
Sep 17th – My 4th 5K run of 2011 – Savoy, IL
Sep 19th – Netflix rebranded their DVD business as Qwikster; Add Game rentals
Sep 19th – Google launches Google Wallet (Wireless payment technology using NFC as its underlying technology) on Sprint
Sep 22nd – HP board replaces CEO Leo Apotheker with former eBay CEO Meg Whitman. Meg became the 6th (counting the interim CEOs) new CEO of HP in the last 10 years
Sep 25th – Watched Moneyball
Sep 28th – Amazon introduces its first Android based tablet – Kindle Fire ($199).


Oct 4th – Apple launches voice controlled (SIRI) iPhone 4S along with iOS 5 & iCloud.
Oct 5th – Steve Jobs died at an age of 56
Oct 8th – Dennis Ritchie - Father of C and Unix passed away
Oct 10th – Netflix kills Qwikster (rebranded DVD business) before its implementation
Oct 13th – Raj Rajaratnam sentenced to spend 11 years in prison (finally some action taken against insider trading)
Oct 19th – Google unveils Android 4.0 a.ka. Ice Cream Sandwich (bundled with facial recognition, Android Beam and revamped user interface menu – Roboto)
Oct 20th - Libyan dictator Moammar Gadhafi was killed by revolutionary forces (Biggest triumph of the Arab revolution)
Oct 20th -  I Ordered White iPhone 4S (64gb)
Oct 23rd – iPod completed 10 years. Thanks you Steve for revolutionizing our music world
Oct 25th – IBM named Virginia Rometty as first female CEO
Oct 26th – Received iPhone 4S (our first ever) – good day…good day indeed
Oct 28th – HP decided not to spin off PC business


Nov 1st – Blog completed 1 year - Wow !!!
Nov 4th - IPO of Groupon – Target open price $20 per share, planning to sell 35 million share on its first day and will raise around $700 million
Nov 29th – American Airline file for bankruptcy
Nov 30th – DOW largest gain since March 2009 up by 4.24% (increase of 490.05 points)


Dec 2nd – Jobless rate drops to 2 year low to 8.6%
Dec 14th – Date with GMAT (scored dismal 370)
Dec 16th – Zynga (popular Facebook game maker) launched its IPO - largest technology IPO since Google. Shares open at $10, driving Zynga’s valuation to around $7 billion.
Dec 17th – North Korea’s Kim Jong II died. Kim Jong’s 29 year old son named as his successor.
Dec 19th – AT & T dropped its bid to own T-Mobile. The merger that fall apart will punish AT & T by making the company pay $4 billion to T-Mobile.
Dec 20th – Apple bought Anobit (flash manufacturing company based in Israel) for around $500 million.
Dec 22nd – Watched Mission Impossible – Ghost Protocol
Dec 28th - Received official GMAT report and got a perfect score of 6.0 in the AWA section
Dec 31st - Apple's Design guru has been made a Knight Commander of the British Empire - "Sir" Jonathan Ive


That's it fellas. It is a long post and I thank you all for reading it.

I wish people around the World a wonderful and prosperous New Year. Hope you all will be able to make some resolutions for the new year and work towards making them true.

Enjoy and Have Fun !!!!!!

Perfect score - AWA (GMAT)

I got the official scores for the GMAT today. I have mentioned earlier on this blog that I failed miserably in the GMAT. I don’t know whether I should consider my GMAT debacle as an act of failure as I haven’t studied at all for this exam. That is an open discussion from my end and it seems the contest between me and my inner conscious will go on for sometime.

Good news is that this official GMAT report has bring in some hope for me as far as my GMAT journey is concerned. I got a perfect score of 6.0 in AWA (Analytical Writing Assessment). According to the GMAT scoring scale, the score of 6.0 some how resolves to 91 percentile which according to GMAT is the highest score in the AWA section of the exam. The AWA section comprises of two essays of 30 minutes each (one asking to analyse an argument and the other asking to analyse an issue).

Fun part is I never knew what AWA structure looks like nor I have read anything about it. First time I saw anything related to AWA was during the time I was giving the GMAT and yet I scored perfectly. It seems all the efforts I did in order to write 130+ posts on this blog has finally paid off. I am pretty happy that I’ve made the decision to start this blog which in return has improved my writing skills (atleast this is what GMAT thinks).

The score of 6.0 in the AWA section has given me some motivation that I can still do something about my GMAT. It seems some part of my brain is still functioning and I need to act fast before becoming brain dead.

Review: Mission Impossible - Ghost Protocol

It seems all that has been said and written about the latest Mission Impossible (Ghost Protocol) turns out to be true. I am extremely happy for the way things are moving in the favour of the Mission Impossible series. I got the chance to watch the movie last weekend and I am completely blown away by the movie, the concept, the direction, the latest electronic gadgetry and the breath taking stunts performed by none other than but Tom Cruise himself. Seeing Tom Cruise in action was fun, specially the Burj Khalifa scene was a classic Tom Cruise stunt. Cruise is almost 50 and by no way you can guess his age by looking at the incredible things he does which not only require tremendous energy but a lot of motivation and hard work. I am equally impressed with Jeremy Renner and I believe he got a bright future ahead of him.

Brad Bird (director of Incredibles & Ratatouille) have done a fantastic job in directing this movie. Keeping into consideration that Mission Impossible is Bird’s first live-action movie I guess he should make more live actioners than animated movies.

It was a fantastic year as far as movies are concerned. I have started the year with Transformers and now Mission Impossible is the perfect ending to this incredible year, as far as movies are concerned. Hope 2012 will bring in more excitement and fun and hope we all will see really good movies in the coming year.

Mission Impossible is a must watch.

The mission is to watch Mission Impossible – Ghost Protocol as soon as possible. Your mission should you choose to accept…..Hell YA !!!!

The Hobbit - An Unexpected Journey (HD Trailer)

Watch the trailer of "The Hobbit - An Unexpected Journey". This will be another eagerly awaited movies which will come out next year. Peter Jackson is one of my favourite directors and hope he can recreate the magic of Lord of the Rings in this prequel.

Gollum is back !!

The Dark Knight Rises (HD Trailer # 2)

Those of you who have watched the 9 minutes preview of the The Dark Knight Rises in IMAX last weekend were very lucky to see the introduction of Bane, for the remaining ones like us here is the 2nd trailer of the most awaited movie of next year. Mark my words this movie will rock as Chris Nolan is trying to compete with himself. If you are still not convinced then watch the football field scene in the trailer below and decide for your self. Bane is coming and so is Chris Nolan's another master piece.

"When Gotham is ashes," Bane tells Wayne. "You have my permission to die".

Can't wait to watch this one.

370

I got 370 in the GMAT. All my predictios were correct as far as the score is concern. Read my previous post to know more about that. Unfortunately GMAT percentile is no way in proportion to your estimates it tests your ability in Quant and Verbal.

Now I need to sit back and decide what I would like to do about it. I have no regrets about this score because I haven’t studied at all and once again read the previous post to know more about that. My only concern is how to deal with this situation and what plan needs to be in place if I still want to give GMAT.

Heading for the disaster - Date with GMAT

In precisely two hours or so I will sit in my car and head towards the GMAT exam center. Oh yeah, after postponing this exam for almost 2 years the time has come that I should look into the eyes of GMAT. The important question is, am I ready to do so? With the heavy heart I must admit I am most certainly not ready to face the GMAT.... not today. Then why the hell I am inclined towards giving the GMAT? Well to be frank I have decided that I have to give the GMAT no matter what before the year end and I guess the time has come to complete what I have decided. Moreover so far postponing the exam has not helped me and somehow I am not able to tune my mind or get myself disciplined enough to prepare for the exam. I know it is hard to explain in words but this is what it is.

So what happen and why I was not able to prepare? Was it my work schedule, home duties, wife, kids blah blah blah? To answer that, no one should be blamed as it is me who should be held responsible for not preparing for the GMAT. It is me and only me from the beginning as I was not able to come with a solid prep plan and I was not able to teach myself to be a disciplinarian to study for the GMAT.

There are very few out there who actually know what they are going to score in the GMAT or exams like that. Some of them are the ones who have studied relentlessly for the exam, put in hundreds of hours for the preparation, solved thousands of problems, and faced my practice tests and they are the one who can estimate to some extent what there score might be. On the other hand there are also some people like me who haven't study a bit and knows what they are going to score. If today is my lucky day then I will score in the 400s, if there is a miracle that had to happen, then in 500s, but I am most certainly sure that I might end up in upper 200s to lower 300s. Now who can be so sure about getting such freaky percentiles ? Well I am, because I know my skills are pretty rusty and this is what I will be getting.

I am sure, this might be one of the most unusual posts you have ever read. Oh common at least give me some credit for writing this and admitting this to the World. Time to wrap up as I need to move out and head towards the fighting ring with no gloves or protective gear, forget about the practice as I haven't done any for this match.That's it folks, I move towards the fighting arena where the GMAT is waiting to slaughter me. I can't ask for your best wishes as luck favors the prepared mind and I am not prepared ....not for this one and most certainly not today.

I will fight back !! (with GMAT or with myself that I haven’t decided).

SIRI get me some Mt. Dew

SIRI has been out there and I must say that so far it has done an outstanding job. Everyone knew that this can be a revolutionary technology and it sure lives up to its expectations. SIRI has been truly amazing and some what magical (watch the 3rd video in this blog and you’ll be amazed). Watch out the videos below to see it how developers are tweaking the protocols of SIRI and making it do things it will eventually end up doing for you and me.

Opening a door lock with SIRI



SIRI proxy demo (adjusting the thermostat)



Starting the car with SIRI (this is my favorite)




So what is next in line for SIRI? SIRI go open the refrigerator and get me some Mountain Dew, no ice please.

Happy 1st Birthday Blog !!

Time flies. Sure it does. Today my blog turned 1 and I am totally excited about it. I waited many months before embarking on this journey of writing my blog and what started as a small task nurtured by my imagination has now became a regular feature of my day to day life. For someone like me who lives on the intersection of technology and business, I guess this blog will surely solves the purpose of sharing interesting and fun stuff with all of you. I never anticipated that I will continue to write this blog as I am someone who gets bored easliy due to monotonicity but this blog has made me a different person all together. I confess that this is something which is not boring. In fact I enjoy writing stuff on this blog and I hope to continue to do so.

With 130 posts and 3,660 page views I cannot ask for more. I would like to thank everyone out there who reads my blog, I would also like to thank you if you are somene who stumbled on this blog accidentaly (hope eventually you’ve found out what you’re looking for).

I am grateful to the visitors from all these countries who have landed on this blog and I hope you like stuff that I have written & shared on this blog.

United States
Australia
United Kingdom
Singapore
Germany
Philippines
Brazil
Canada
Colombia
Cyprus
Vietnam
India
Russia
France
Indonesia
Spain
Iran
Japan
Latvia
Hong Kong

So far this journey of writing this blog has been truly amazing and I would like keep it that way. My only concern about the blog experience is that I rarely get comments on this blog. I know out there someone is reading it, but it would be great if you leave comments on my blog as this is the only way I’ll come to know how I am doing and I come to know about you. Comments ignites conversations and conversations starts debates, which I believe is quitessential to know the views of people around the world. Don’t worry if you don’t know me and I don’t know you, in this age of internet we all are getting acquainted to each other by our actions and responses. So if you wish to comment about something on this blog, then please feel free to do so.

I end this post with the promise that in the coming years I would like to make this blog more interesting and fun to read. Wish me luck and I wish the same for all of you out there.

Happy 1st Birthday Blog and many more to come.

Must Watch: Mission Impossible IV (Burj Khalifa behind the scene)

Now this why I like Tom Cruise. Watch the video below, and may be you too would like what he does (his own stunts). Sure it looks scary but this is what it takes to make you different from others. Looking forward to watching this one in December.

Got iPhone 4S - Not living under the rock anymore

Just got the news from my wife that the iPhone 4S has been delivered. It is the first smart phone in our house and we all are pretty excited about it. After reading tons of information about the how smart phones are changing this world and our lives it is time for me to do some practical work.

I will surely write the detailed blog about my experience with the iPhone. Just cannot wait to make my first contact with Siri.

BTW its 64gb, white and runs on AT&T.

Microsoft's HoloDesk - Direct 3D

I would like to share this video with you and instead of me explaining what it is I would recommend watching it instead. This is one of the coolest Microsoft innovations in a long time (atleast this is what I believe).



 There are myriad of applications that can make use of this technology. I am just looking forward to see Microsoft  make this technology available to the consumers. Till then, the video above will keep us all entertained and guessing about what is coming next.

Good job Microsoft. We would all like this to be in our hands someday. Hope that day is not far.

C-spire becomes the 4th US carrier for the iPhone

I find this news quite amazing that C-spire (never heard of it) will be the 4th US carrier for the iPhone. C-spire is having a substantial foot print in the southern US (Mississippi and nearby areas) and it seems Apple really want people in the south to adopt iPhone as their primary smart phone. Usually southerners are not that tempted towards the new technology and this might be the chance for them to get used to the latest and the greatest.

C-spire will start selling the CDMA iPhone in the coming few weeks and more information can be gathered from here. This should be a strategic move by Apple otherwise it won’t happen. So who is next in line to get the iPhone? May be MetroPCS but then it all depends on Apple and its management. This is a good news and good news can always ignite good competition.

Apple miss fourth quarter earnings (unexpected)

Apple released its earnings for the fourth quarter and the results are far from what analysts have expected. This is for the first time since 2004 that Apple’s financial results were not as per the expectations of the wall street analysts. The shares of Apple are down 7% in the after hours trading.

Analysts had expected Apple to earn $7.39 per share on revenue of $29.69 billion but Apple declared that it earned $7.05 a share with a revenue of $28.3 billion. Apple also fall short on the sale of iPhones for the fourth quarter and one reason for that might be the delayed launch of the new iPhone. Street analysts predicted that Apple will sell 18-20 million iPhones where as Apple sold around 17 million iPhones in the fourth quarter.

However keeping into consideration the upcoming holiday season, the earning guidance for the next quarter is set for $37 billion and earning per share guidance is set to $9.30. I am sure Apple will have a blasting holiday season and will be able to beat the targets set for the next quarter.

For Apple's press release please go here.

Father of C and Unix passed away

Dennis Ritchie the father of C and Unix died past weekend. We should all be thankful to Dennis Ritchie for creating C and the Unix OS as without them most of us won’t be working in this amazing field of computer science. If I were in control I will replace the Intel sign from the devices we all use in day to day basis and replace them all with a C logo. Without C and the Unix OS most of the things accomplished by mankind won’t be possible.

I know I am late, but I would like to thank Dennis for creating these tools which are till date and in future will shape the existence of human race as far as technical advancements are concerned.

Thank you Dennis !!

iPhone 4S pre-orders set new record

This has been an exceptional moment in the history of the iPhone and I am sure Steve is watching all this from the heaven. According to the press release from Apple the company has sold around 1 million iPhone 4S in its first 24 hours. This has been a new record as 600,000 iPhones (iPhone 4) were sold last year when the pre order started. This just shows how much people love Apple and its products and if things go like this then iPhone 4S will be a major hit (which I am sure it will).

Long Live Steve Jobs !!!!

Steve, you were, you are and you will always be my hero.

It is indeed a very sad day for all of us.

May Steve Jobs' soul rest in peace.

Highlights: Apple's 'Let's Talk iPhone' event

Here are the highlights of the event that took place at the campus of Apple. Apple introduces iPhone 4S (not iPhone 5) as its next iteration in the iPhone series. When compared with iPhone 4, there are no cosmetic changes in the new phone (4S). 4S is the same phone from the outside but all an all a very solid phone from the inside. I got a bit disappointed with Apple as they should have at least made some external changes to this new phone. They took 15 months to release this phone and the hype and expectations were way too high. I guess people won’t accept the external make up of this new phone. Apple should have made the phone much more sleek and should have made significant changes to the phone design as this is what we as consumers would like to see.

I might be wrong but from the Live blog it looks like if we keep the 2 phones (4 & 4S) next to each other we would not be able to distinguish between the two phones and this is what consumers don’t like. I mean if you buy the 4S and people still thinks you have the iPhone 4 then what’s the fun in buying the new phone. Most of the time when you are around with your friends or relatives it is the external features that attracts the people around you and they just don’t care what is inside the phone. I am sure Apple might have some very strong strategy behind the way they planned the launch of this new iPhone.

Anyways here goes the list of things which I guess are the keys points of this event:

iOS 5 & iCloud available on October 12th. Wireless upgrade for iOS 5 (just like OS X Lion)

iTunes Match is $24.99 per year (available end of October).

iPod nano (with new cool watch displays and embedded fitness app) - $149 for 16 GB, $129 for 8GB. Available October 12th.

iPod - 8GB is now $199, 32GB for $299, 64GB for $399. Available on October 12th.

iPhone 4S - A5 chip, 2x faster than before, with dual-core graphics, which are said to be seven times faster than previous iPhone. The 4S will offer eight hours of 3G talk time, six hours of browsing, nine on WiFi, ten hours of video, and forty hours of music. Download speeds are now twice, 14.4Mbps versus 7.2 on the iPhone 4. 8 megapixel sensor that shoots 3264×2448, backside illumination with a sensor that gathers 72 percent more light, hybrid IR filter for better color accuracy and a 5 element lens that offers 30 percent more sharpness and F/2.4 aperture. 1080p HD for video recording.

The best feature of the new iPhone is voice control feature called SIRI (still in beta mode). Check my previous blog for more details about SIRI. During the presentation Apple executives carried out the conversation with the iPhone via SIRI and the demo looks pretty good. Here are the few queries made to the phone and SIRI’s response is amazing.

"What is the weather like today?" SIRI: Here is the forecast for today.


"What is the hourly forecast." SIRI: Here is the weather for today.


"Do I need a raincoat today?" SIRI: It sure looks like rain today.


"Wake me up tomorrow at 6 a.m." SIRI: OK, I set it for 6 am.


"Who are you?" SIRI: "I am a humble personal assistant."

Black and white versions of the new iPhone 4S are - 16GB for $199, 32GB for $299, 64GB for $399. The iPhone 4 is now $99 for 8GB. The 8GB 3GS will be free on contract. Pre-orders for the 4S start this Friday, the 7th October and the phone is available on October 14th.

It'll hit US, Canada, Australia, the UK, France, Germany, and Japan. In the US it'll be Verizon, AT&T, and Sprint. Oh yeah, Sprint is the new iPhone carrier here in the US and it could be big for Sprint. On the 28th of October 22 more countries will get the iPhone 4S, and 70 other countries will get the new iPhone by the end of the year. All in all iPhone 4S will have over 100 carriers.

According to me SIRI is the only significant and cool feature of this new iPhone and Apple will try to beat the competition by tweaking SIRI and making it more robust for the consumers. All eyes now on Friday when the pre-order will start. Will iPhone 4S be another promising and smashing product for Apple? Well, I think so.

iPhone 5 + SRI + AI = Assistant

As we all know by now that Apple will be launching iPhone 5 (or as a matter of fact the new iPhone whatever that might be called) tomorrow and we all are pretty excited about it. I am sure the new iPhone will be rocking and will have tons of sweet & neat upgrades, but there is this one particular upgrade which I am looking forward to. If the hype on the web is all correct than it seems Apple will launch this very amazing upgrade with the new iPhone called “Assistant”. Year and a half back Apple acquired SRI, one of the early developers of this AI (Artificial Intelligence) based supercool voice recognition technology and hopefully once iPhone is released we all will get to see the technology in action.

Head over to this link to know more about “Assistant” and the related history behind it. In addtion to that there is this this interview with the co-founder of SRI - Norman Winarksy on the same link. Norman explains what to expect out of the merger of Apple & SRI and if "Assistant" gets launched tomorrow then how it can change the way we interact with smart devices.

Tomorrow is indeed a huge day for Apple and who knows with the launch of Assistant that might become a World Changing Event (as quoted by Norman in the interview). More on iPhone tomorrow, till then let the last minute rumor mill gets rolling.

Amazon Silk (Mobile web browsing platform)

As I have mentioned in my last blog that I am excited about the tablet (Fire) introduced by Amazon, but I am more curious and interested in learning what Amazon’s new mobile browsing platform had to offer. After much investigation and reading the information given by Amazon I reached the conclusion that Silk (the name given by Amazon to this smart piece of web browsing technology) can be ground breaking and it has the potential to change the way data gets delivered and accessed over the network in the hand held devices.

Amazon knows that they are the God of cloud computing and their server farms are one of the best and biggest in the World. Keeping into consideration the unfathomable computing power generated in the data centers of Amazon, Silk will make data processing lightening fast by making use of AWS (Amazon Web Services) and the underlying EC2 (elastic cloud). There has been this amazing video (see below) where the engineers from Amazon explained the functionality of Silk, its underlying principles and the dynamic split browsing functionality.



I truly liked the concept behind Silk. In this cloud driven technical world Silk has got the potential to make a big impression. Let’s see what the consumers had to say about Silk. As for me, I am totally sold to this concept. Watch the video above and decide.

Amazon firing on all cylinders

Today in NYC, Jeff Bezon (CEO Amazon) unvelied the impressive Kindle product line.

Kindle (4th gen) - $79

Kindle Touch - $99

Kindle Touch 3G - $149

Kindle Fire (tablet) - $199 (7-inch IPS display, dual-core processor, 14.6 ounces). Fire ships November 15th and you can pre-order it today.

This could be a game changer as Kindle Fire will compete neck to neck with Apple's iPad. Amazon has released their first tablet computer at an astonishing price of $199 and this could ignite the fierce competition. Another big day for Android, as Kindle Fire will get all its fire from the open source OS and I am sure that will leave an lasting impression on the consumers. I really need to see Amazon Silk in action. This is the new browing platform based on the powerful EC2 (elastic cloud) technology offered by Amazon and it functions on the principle of dynamic split browsing another thing which makes me curious on its functionality.

See Kindle Fire in action:



Well done Amazon. Tablet war on its peak and all eyes are now on the October 4th event, when Apple will release the much talked about iPhone 5.

Movie Review: Moneyball

I wanted to watch “Moneyball” since I saw the trailer sometime back. “Moneyball” rocks and I loved it. Both Brad Pitt and Jonah Hill have done an excellent job. The movie is based on the book (Moneyball) by Michael Lewis. The screenplay is written by none other than Steve Zaillan and Aaron Sorkin, the team that gave us “The Social Network” last year.

It does not matter if you are a baseball fan or not, “Moneyball” will keep you entertained till the very last moment. On the other hand “Moneyball” is a full 2 hour lesson in the amazing field of sports management or rather any management. If you are a manager or planning to be one in the near future, watch “Moneyball” and I am sure you will like it and learn a lot from watching it.

Another good movie which I am pretty sure will make it to the Oscars next year.

Winner: Innovation challenge

It gives me an immense pleasure to write this on my blog that I along with my fellow co-worker who also happened to be my friend and mentor were declared the winners of the innovation challenge held at my company. This was the first ever event that took place at my place of work and our 2 man team won undisputedly. We took part in 2 innovative challenges and to my surprise we won both of them. In both the challenges the competition was fierce but we beat our competitors by being superior in our design and in our method of exceution.

Our team won $200 ($100 per challenge). I know the price money was not that great. Moreover we took those innovation challenges to tinker our brain cells and it is not for the money. The best part is me and my friend have decided to donate the prize money ($200) to charity. Hope our efforts will make someone smile.

Well done me.

Movie Review: Warrior

Watched “Warrior” last weekend and I liked it very much. The movie is based on the championship fight called Sparta where various athletes demonstrate their fighting skills in MMA (Mixed Martial Arts). The story revolves around 2 brothers and the roles were played by Tom Hardy & Joel Edgerton. I must say that both of these actors have played their roles to perfection. Tom Hardy was one of my favorites. I liked his role in Inception and now he is playing the bad guy (Bane) in the upcoming Batman movie. In “Warrior” Tom Hardy represents flawless raw emotions and I must say that his acting skills have improved a lot. I just can’t imagine how hard he had worked in shaping up his physique for this role and the role of Bane.

Though the movie revolved around the story of these two brothers and how they face each other in the ring to fight for the championship title, but to me the best part of this movie was the performance of Nick Nolte. I simply got smitten by Nick’s acting and I must say that he deserves an Oscar for this performance. I recommend watching “Warrior” not for the kicks and the MMA fighting sequences but for the superb acting and the story that weaves the movie and all its characters together.

Last year “The Fighter” did a great job at the Oscars and I wish that “Warrior” could do the same. I was planning to watch “Contagion” but my mind got changed at the last moment. After watching “Warrior” I have no regrets for the last minute change of plans and I am happy I got to see something totally awesome.

Yahoo fired CEO Carol Bartz....

...over the phone.

This is what Carol wrote to Yahoo employees (from her ipad).

To all,
I am very sad to tell you that I’ve just been fired over the phone by Yahoo’s Chairman of the Board. It has been my pleasure to work with all of you and I wish you only the best going forward.
Carol
Sent from my iPad


Will this be the turning point for Yahoo? Well if someone can acquire Yahoo then things will get changed. The question is who will come forward and take the risk of buying Yahoo, specially when it is not performing well. Another chance for Microsoft to come forward, but I guess that won't happen.

August Rush

So far, the month of August by all means was the most volatile month of this year. In order to publish my yearly event log I am compiling the list of all the important events that took place in a month. I know we still have almost 4 months left in this year but here I am presenting you with the events that took place in the month of August. Thanks to globalization, I am sure we all get impacted by these events in some way or the other.

Here goes the list.

Aug 4th – Dow loses 512.76 point (4.31% down), NASDAQ loses 136.68 points (5.08% down), S&P500 loses 60.27 points (4.78% down) – Worst day for the market since Dec 2008

Aug 5th – S&P downgraded the US debt rating to AA+ from AAA

Aug 8th – S&P downgraded the debt rating for mortgage finance giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to AA+

Aug 8th - Dow loses 634.76 point (5.55% down), NASDAQ loses 174.72 points (6.09% down), S&P500 loses 79.92 points (6.66% down) – Another very bad day for the market since Dec 2008

Aug 9th – Apple overtakes Exxon Mobil for the first time to become the most valuable public company (in any field of business).

Aug 10th – And another bad day for the market. DOW sheds 519.83 point, NASDAQ loses 101.47 point and S&P loses 51.77 point.

Aug 10th – At the close of the market, Apple ahead of Exxon Mobil for the first time ever and became the most valuable company in the world.

Aug 15th - Google decided to acquire Motorola Mobility for $40.00 per share in cash, or a total of about $12.5 billion.

Aug 18th – HP decided to abandon Touchpad & WebOS, and confirm its plan to spin off PC business.

Aug 24th – Steve Jobs stepped down as Apple’s CEO. Tim Cook became new Apple CEO

Aug 25th – Linux OS turned 20

Though, I might have missed tons of other things that have happened during the month of August, but the events mentioned above were significant enough to get hold of my attention and hence they turned out to be the part of my yearly event log and on this blog.

Why you must watch "Rise of the Planet of the Apes"

I decided to watch “Rise of the Planet of the Apes” the moment I came to know that Weta Digital will be associated with this movie. My decision was not wrong and I am glad that I stick to it. We will come back to Weta in a moment but first let me tell you that “Rise of the Planet of the Apes” is not the movie to be missed. It is an excellent film with an eye opening message. This movie is not about some crazy bunch of Apes trying to bring chaos and destruction to the city of San Francisco, but this movie is about crazy human beings who can go to any extent to prove what they are doing is correct and whatever harsh decisions they are taking will proliferate man kind and eradicate some of the most dangerous and incurable diseases from the face of our planet. Well this issue is debatable and I am sure there will be no end to it.

Watch “Rise of the Planet of the Apes” for its excellent direction, heart touching story and superb performaces by all the actors, specially Andy Serkis. Now if any of you don’t know who Andy Serkis is then it is completely fine. Andy Serkis is the man who hides his face behind the CGI and has played some of the very unforgettable characters. Andy was the one who played Gollum in “Lord of the Rings”, he also played the role of the mighty “King Kong” (Peter Jackson’s version) and in “Rise of the Planet of the Apes” he played the role of Caesar. I guess both Weta Digital and Andy did an outstanding job by creating Caesar. You won’t be able to make out that Caesar is the creation of the magical motion captured CGI. The CGI effects are simply flawless and very neatly done. The expressions given by Andy Serkis were superb and heart touching. I am wondering if Academy will consider Andy’s role (as Caesar) and will nominate him in any of the best actors category. Hope after watching that you will feel the same.

Watch out this behind the scenes video to see how Weta and Andy created Caesar.



Now coming back to Weta Digital, it is one of the best CGI makers in the business of film making. Peter Jackson founded the company way back in 1999 and I recommed checking the wiki page to get more details on that. Based in Wellington (New Zealand), Weta brings in world renowned talent in the art of CGI and related effects under one roof. The team at Weta was responsible for creating some awe-inspiring CGI and bringing in some historical achievements in this elite field of film making. Lord of the Rings, Avatar, District 9 and King Kong were among the very best of Weta’s projects. For more movie projects of Weta, visit this link.

Go watch “Rise of the Planet of the Apes” and I am pretty sure you’ll like it. The movie does question your inner conscious about animal cruelty by repeatedly asking you these questions – are we doing justice to these innocent creatures, for the sake of experimentation are we using them as petri dish, will there be any alternative solution to test new drugs? Well as I have mentioned all these questions are debatable.

To me “Rise of the Planet of the Apes” was the best summer film for this year. Though it got released 4 weeks back, it continued to be among the top 5 grossers in the US. Go watch this movie and see how "Evolution becomes Revolution" (which is also the tagline of this movie).

Steve Jobs's 313 patents

There is this excellent resource (courtesy NYT) that published the list of 313 patents where the name of Steve Jobs is mentioned along with the other inventors. Patents related to and ranging from computers to ipods to iOS devices to packaging to power adapters to designing the glass staircase (which we see in the Apple store) shows Steve’s impeccable record and demonstrates his genius. Go to this link and explore. Click on each and every picture in the link to get more details on the patent.

The information presented is unbelievable and truly amazing. Hope NYT keeps this page alive for ever. Good stuff, indeed.

Book review: The Big Switch by Nicholas Carr

Last night I finished reading “The Big Switch – Rewiring the World from Edison to Google” by Nicholas Carr. This book is a pretty good primer for anyone who would like to learn about the basics of cloud computing or SaaS or Software as a Service. In addition to the simple writing style Nic Carr also educates the reader on how the world and our society got changed with the invention of electricity and how the computers and the internet are once again revolutionizing the world. I feel somehow the author is smitten by the technological developments at Google and I have no complaints with that. Time and again he refers back to what Google is doing and why Google is a leader in the field of cloud computing. I guess apart from Google there are pretty good players out there which deserves their names to be mentioned when discussing about the cloud but again Nic did an excellent job and covers all the major points related to the cloud in this book so no complaints.

I am trying to get back on my reading habit and will try to reduce my reading backlog. Though I having a tight schedule, but the good news is that I have completed this book in a short time. Next on my table and on my reading list are 2 very interesting books – “Ghost in the Wires: My Adventures as the World's Most Wanted Hacker by Kevin Mitnick” and “The Big Short: Inside the Doomsday Machine by Michael Lewis”. In the past in my blog “Hackerville” I have wrote about Kevin Mitnick and what he is capable of, go check it out. Michael Lewis is another amazing writer, and now I am confused which one to read.

I will probably go for the autobiography of Kevin Mitnick (Ghost in the Wires) first and after that will take on Michael Lewis. Reading is fun and I will make sure it will stay that way for me forever.

Steve Jobs steps down (resigns as CEO of Apple)

Tim Cook is the new Apple CEO, effective immediately. It is a sad news indeed. I have no words to describe what impact this will make on the loyal Apple community and its users, but one thing is for sure that this will not stop Apple's success as a company.

Here is what Steve Jobs said in his resignation letter:

To the Apple Board of Directors and the Apple Community:

I have always said if there ever came a day when I could no longer meet my duties and expectations as Apple’s CEO, I would be the first to let you know. Unfortunately, that day has come.

I hereby resign as CEO of Apple. I would like to serve, if the Board sees fit, as Chairman of the Board, director and Apple employee.

As far as my successor goes, I strongly recommend that we execute our succession plan and name Tim Cook as CEO of Apple.

I believe Apple’s brightest and most innovative days are ahead of it. And I look forward to watching and contributing to its success in a new role.

I have made some of the best friends of my life at Apple, and I thank you all for the many years of being able to work alongside you.

Steve

Good Luck Steve. You are my Hero.

Must Watch - Portal: No Escape

I am a very big fan of the Portal game and I knew this would happen some day. Well friends there is this short film on youtube which is selling like hot cakes and it has around 500,000 views in just 2 days. The movie took 1.5 years in the making and it got created by Dan Trachtenberg. Even if you don't know about this game I am sure you will like this short film. I wish that someday this will be made into the full length movie. Enjoy the video below (in full screen and HD) and experience the crazy world of Portal.

Apple App store is down

[Update@12:25 pm CST] - The App store is up now. Not sure what was the reason for this outage.

This morning at around 9:00 am CST when I tried to access the online Apple store the page was not able to load. At first I thought it was just me but soon after that I came to know that the Apple store is down. Usually when this happens Apple will put some kind of notification about the maintenance they are performing. Somehow I am not having a good feeling about it and I might be wrong. Currently it is around 12:00 pm CST and the site seems to be down, still. It seems to be a pretty big down time for the Apple store and I guess nobody has anticipated that.

Are they launching any new product or are they being hacked or is it some unusual unsuspected server crash? Well we need to wait and check out what exactly happened. Hope Apple will release the reasons for this downtime. Will keep you updated as soon as I am able to access the Apple store.

Google strikes back: Plan to acquire Motorola Mobility

Google decided to acquire Motorola Mobility for $40.00 per share in cash, or a total of about $12.5 billion. Now as we all know by now that this is a huge news. This will make the smart phone competition more interesting and challenging. This is the clear indication that now Google is making itself more stronger and this deal will bring Google in direct competition with Apple. So far Apple is the only company that makes both the mobile software and the hardware, and now Google will do the same once this deal will be done sometime by the end of this year or the beginning of next year.

In the war of the patents Google has been a loser and this seems to be the revenge of Larry Page. Google did not did well and was not able to capture what it was looking for during the Nortel patent saga. With this deal Google got 17,000 Motorola patents plus 7000 Motorola patents which are in the pipeline, making it a total of around 24,000 patents. I believe Google is smart enough to spend it cash wisely and to me they are not after the patents, may be they are, but to me it is more of a strategic deal. I am not an expert here but to me 24,000 patents for $12.5 billion is a not such a good deal. What worries me as of now is that with this deal Google got an additional of 19,000 Motorola employees and their current strenght is 29,000 which is like 60% increase in the workforce of Google. I am sure Larry have had that in mind before he proceed to make this deal. There are some serious questions for the leadership and mangement teams at Google on how they plan to manage such a massive work force? Google has been a software company for all these years and now with this deal it is entering the hardware market which could become another challenging job for the search giant. Out an out this has been an intresting move by Google and will surely proliferate the unstoppable Android and its followers and we see get a huge spike in the mobile operating system. To get more details on this deal read Larry’s blog here.

Not sure what will be Apple’s reaction on this one, but I guess it will not do much about it. Time for Microsoft to make a move and buy Nokia. I was pretty sure that Microsoft will buy Nokia sometime this year but I have never imagined that Google will make a first move. Anyway I guess it is never too late for Microsoft to add the dying Nokia into its family.

With this deal the smart phone war has become pretty sweet and of course fun to watch. I know I said that before and I guess I will keep saying that as there is still lot more to come.

Apple beats Exxon Mobil and becomes most valuable company

Market lose is Apple’s gain and today for the first time ever Apple is ahead of Exxon Mobil in the total market valuation and thus now Apple becomes the most valuable company in the World. Yesteday for the first time Apple took the lead and was ahead of Exxon Mobil, but Exxon recovered at the close of the market and got ahead of Apple. Today there was no stopping for the tech giant (thanks to the massive market crash) and now Apple is ahead of Exxon Mobil in market capitalization by a total of $6.4 billion.


It is extremely remarkable for Apple because last year it overtook Microsoft to become the most valued tech company and today it overtook Exxon to become the most valued company in any field of business. At the start of this year Apple was $75 billion behind Exxon and as of today Apple is ahead of Exxon by $6.4 billion.

Great Job Steve or Steve Job(s) great.

Apple surpasses both Nokia & US Treasury

Believe it or not but this is happening.

Apple has surpassed Nokia as the # 1 smartphone maker in the world. That is correct and the news came out yesterday. It seems even Samsung beat Nokia and emerged as # 2 on this list. Strategy Analytics have made this announcement public and you can visit this link to read more about it. This had to happen sooner or later and we all know about this. The only worry for Apple is the Android OS for mobile devices as Android is gaining amazing momentum and is currently way ahead of the iOS. Hopefully with the launch of iOS 5 and the new iPhone Apple will try to reduce the lead, but as of now, Android is unstoppable.

Another interesting thing which I would like to mention is the Apple cash which is creating history as we speak. I read this amazing analysis where it seems Apple has surpassed the US Treasury as far as cash is concerned. We all know that the US has been going through one of the worst debt crisis and god only know what will happen post Aug 2nd if the debt ceiling has not been raised. And here are the figures that will make you go berserk. Apple has the total cash balance of $76.156 billion and on the other hand we have US treasury which has the balance of $73.768 billion. Now that is just amazing and totally unbelievable.

OS X Lion will be available tomorrow

The Lion will roar tomorrow. During Apple’s quarterly earnings conference call it was announced by Peter Oppenheimer (CFO Apple) that OS X Lion will be available tomorrow on the MAC APP store. As we all know that this release of OS X will only be available on MAC APP store and there won’t be any DVD’s so please don’t look out for any. If you are running Core2 duo or later and has OS X 10.6.6 or later then you will be able to download the complete OS via APP store. For someone like me, who is still running Leopard this would be a 2 step process. First I need to upgrade my Macbook to Snow Leopard and from there I need to upgrade it to Lion. I would be happy to know if someone knows the procedure of upgrading to Lion straight from Leopard.

There is this very interesting information from the site of Macworld explaining the upgrade procedure. Please check that out here.

Lion is the biggest wild cats out there so I assume that this would bring an end to the family of OS X. Apple only knows what they will introduce as a successor to the OS X. I guess there is still time to think about all that, for now let’s download Lion and see whether Apple succeeded in their effort of merging the iOS with the OS X.

Apple's fantabulous Q3 earnings report

Today Apple released its earnings for the third quarter and as expected the result is just fabulous. Apple has proved time and again that they are the best. Even without releasing the new iPhone, Apple easily surpassed the expectations of the Wall Street.

This is what Steve Jobs said during the earnings press release: "We're thrilled to deliver our best quarter ever, with revenue up 82 percent and profits up 125 percent. Right now, we're very focused and excited about bringing iOS 5 and iCloud to our users this fall."

Revenue increased by 82% to $28.57 billion. EPS (earning per share) for this quarter is $7.79 and the expected EPS was $5.85. The guidance set by Apple for the current quarter is $25 billion with an EPS of $5.5. I am pretty sanguine that Apple will beat this guidance. The after hours shares of Apple (AAPL) rose by 5% and still moving upwards.

Apple still has lots of things to release this fall. The OS X Lion will be coming out tomorrow (atleast that is  what people expect) and soon that will be followed by iCloud, iOS 5 and the new iPhone and the iPad. No stopping for Apple in the near future. Techs (Apple, Google, IBM) are leading this season of the quarterly earnings and driving the markets north. Still there are lot to come as far as earnings report is concerned, but with this blowout result from Apple, Wall Street is all geared up for a big rally tomorrow and hopefully this trend will continue.

The Dark Knight Rises - Trailer

The Dark Knight Rises - Chris Nolan's final effort in the batman trilogy. The trailer is out there and it is a must watch. Somehow youtube is not allowing to embed the video. Never mind you can watch it here.

Enjoy. Can't wait to watch this one. I am sure this will be a perfect ending to one of the best super hero series we have ever seen.

Finally....Spotify is here in the US

I knew this would happen sooner or later, but the good news is it did happen. Spotify is here in the US…finally. As I wrote in my blog earlier, Spotify was trying very hard to launch their services here in the US and to the joy of many they did succeed in making that a reality.

The European online music service is now available in the US and I am sure this will generate a huge buzz and we all will see some pretty decent competition between Spotify and the American players (iTunes, Amazon and Google’s music service). Spotify is free by invitation (you need to wait till Spotify sends you the invite). If you are willing to beat the queue, then you need to spend $5 per month and you can enjoy unlimited streaming of Spotify on your computer/laptop and by spending $10 per month (premium) you can enjoy Spotify on your smart phone as well.

With 15 million songs, offline mode and social networking embedded, it seems Spotify is not to be missed.

Time to Spotify.

Stuxnet: The BIG daddy of malwares

I just completed reading this amazing and extremely interesting article on Stuxnet and I must say that this is one of the best cyber warfare articles I have ever read to date. Period.

Those of you who are unware about Stuxnet can the read the wiki page, for others Stuxnet is one of the most sophisticated piece of malware or computer virus ever written in the history of cyber warfares. Sometime in the year 2009 first traces of Stuxnet started to appear around the globe and the full throttle destruction of the virus started last year, 2010. The primary purpose of this virus is not to steal credit card information or achieve other financial gains but the sole purpose of Stuxnet is to roam from computer to computer around the world till it finds and hits an specific job that it is looking for.

The code of Stuxnet was written to alter the functioning of PLCs or programmable logic controllers and Stuxnet was looking for the specific Siemens based Step 7 software and its purpose was to reprogram the hard ware devices running these softwares. Read the article for more details and you will be amazed. Most of the researchers (primarily from Symantec) who deciphered the code of Stuxnet, admit that they have never seen something like this before and the sophistication level of Stuxnet made it one of the elite threats ever encountered by the cyber security professionals.

Stuxnet caused major trouble in Iran by defusing many nuclear centrifudges and achieved its purpose of delaying the nuclear weapon program of Iran. Till date no one is sure who produced or wrote the code of Stuxnet but all fingers and pointing towards a joint collaboration between US and Israel in launching this virus against Iran.

Important thing is now people know what these malwares are capable of and this is something very disturbing. If you haven’t watched Die Hard 4 I recommend watching it, not for its kick ass action sequences but to see what computer worms, viruses and malwares are capable of. I’ll not be shockhed if tomorrow I read another article that says Stuxnet was the idea borrowed straight from Die Hard 4, as gone are the days when someone will write the code to steal your credit card number. Who would care for your credit card number if they can bring down your country and the whole world to its knees by writng 500 kilobytes of code (size of the Stuxnet malware).

This article is something totally worth reading and frightening at the sametime. What happened in the nuclear facilty of Iran can happen anywhere in the world. Stuxnet is out there and who knows like most of the common computer softwares a better and more productive version is on its way.

May God bless and save all mankind from mankind.

Review: Transformers 3

Last Friday I watched Transformers 3 in 3D and I must say that this was one of the best summer action blockbusters I have ever seen. Transformers 3 is surely much better that Transformers 2 and to some extent I will put this one above the first Transformers movie.

Don’t go to watch Shia LaBeouf, don’t go to watch Rosie Huntington-Whiteley, don’t go to watch if you are someone who will judge the movie by its logical depth, but go and see this movie to witness the superb CGI which will blow your mind and go and see this movie to check the excellent direction of Michael Bay (who I believe is very talented and among the very few who can direct a movie of such magnitude.) The only and only purpose of Transformers 3 is to entertain you and trust me you won’t be disappointed. If possible watch the movie in 3D and I am sure you will be amazed by how fast you’ve spend 2hr 24 mins watching this movie.

For me Transformers 3 brings in all the fun and excitement I was looking for in a summer blockbuster and I am sure you will experience the same.

What's keeping me busy...this summer?

Finally summer is here. I am pretty sure individuals living in the mid-west or other parts of the US and the world and have faced severe winter can surely understand the importance of summer and all the fun this season brings along with it.

Here goes the list of things that will keep me busy during this summer. We all will be too busy this summer, as there are various projects that need to be completed before the weather changes its mood. Hopefully that won't be happening till late October but you never know, people living in this part of the world knows how unpredictable weather can play with us and with our plans. Anyways here goes the list.

• Backyard Fencing: I am helping my friend in putting up his backyard fence and I admit that this is the most challenging DIY projects I have ever decided to be the part of. It is both fun and tiring at the same time. I am learning tons of news things which I have never done before – digging 3.5 feet holes (using earth auger), fixing the poles (using concrete mix and water), fixing horizontal and vertical wooden bars and putting together the pickets. This project is taking most of my weekends and it is now around 70% complete. I guess I am getting all the satisfaction of building something new from scratch and this feeling is just fantastic. In today’s virtual world feeding your crops in Farmville (popular online Facebook game) can excite you and make you the virtual master of your farm but to me this fencing project brings in much more excitement as I can physically see the structure taking shape and I don't need the help of anybody in feeding my pigs or whatever happens in the world of Farmville. It is just me, my hands and my drill along with lots of commitment to take control of what I am building.

• Kids Swimming: This is a twice a week activity and both the kids seems to enjoy water. My elder son (5) is now becoming more and more water friendly and gaining confidence under water. The younger one (1.5) goes with me in the pool and for him it is just splashing and some kicking in the water. So far these sessions are more fun as compared to the ones we attended last year.

• GMAT: My GMAT preparation is taking the major hit due to the weather and apart from many things I like about summer this is the one thing which I don’t like. According to me and I might be wrong summer is not the season to study. No matter how hard you try, you just cannot keep yourself indoors and study. This weather is so tempting that you had to come out of your dwellings to enjoy the sun and the surroundings. So my advice to you, if you are someone who is planning your MBA journey and if you are an someone who like to enjoy the summer then plan to prepare for your GMAT in the months of Oct-Mar. There are minimal outdoor activities in these months and the weather will force you to be indoors and will not distract you from studying. As for me I am facing a real tough time preparing for the GMAT in summer, but it is something which I had to finish so that I can start applying for the classes starting next year.

• Running: Last yeat in the summer, I got infected with the running virus and since then it is spreading at an alarming rate and had grown much stronger than before. My running distance and my speed are increasing slowly and gradually and so far I am satisfied with my performance. Still I need to polish lots of things to increase my endurance level and achieve my desired goals and for that I need to practise, practise, and practise. I would admit that I like running not because I need to beat stress or I need to reduce my weight (these are just the by products of running). I like running as I enjoy being on the road or the treadmill and I like pushing my body and see how far I can drag it.

• Reading: Not much has changed on the reading front. I still like reading about anything and everything that excites me. I just ordered the copy of “The Big Switch: Rewiring the World, from Edison to Google” from Amazon and I guess it is on the way as I write this blog. Well if you are curious to learn about this Cloud Computing madness that has gripped the world then you should read this book by Nicholas Carr. I might write my reviews on this blog once I’ll finish reading this book. Another reason to read this book is Nic Carr himself as I really enjoyed his essay “Is Google Making us stupid?” which got published in the Atlantic. It is very intresting to know the views and the perception of Nic Carr and to some extent he is right in what he explains in this essay. I recommend reading the essay.

• Summer Blockbusters: I haven’t seen any movie this summer (not yet). I don’t know how that happened but it seems this blog is self explanatory in giving you the picture of many things that are keeping me busy. If things go well and on schedule then I might go and watch Transformers 3 tonight with my friends and that might kick off the summer movie season for me. I really wanted to watch Super 8 but somehow I missed it. Cars 2 is not having good reviews so I will skip it. My elder one had watched Kung Fu Panda with his mom and he liked it.

I know there are many more things this summer that I have not mentioned in this blog and that are keeping my plate full. I need to deal with them one by one. Fingers crossed.

You all have a safe summer and enjoy each and every day of it, as for me I will go back to the things that I am working on and will try to finish all of them before winter. Good luck to all and may all your summer projects gets completed on time.

Enjoy !!!

Apple's WWDC 2011 sessions online (for free)

If you are interested in knowing what happened at Apple's WWDC 2011 conference then the contents are now available for downloading or streaming from this link. There are over 100 presentation by the Apple engineers this year. Most of them are pretty technical. You might face some challenges understanding them if you don't know anything about COCOA framework and Objective C (the 2 core technologies used by Apple Developers). There are other videos as well for the non-technies to see how MAC OS X Lion and iOS 5 will shape the future of computing.

Create your account for free and watch the presentations. This is one hell of an opportunity for someone who wants to get the feel of WWDC without spending $1,599 (WWDC registration fee).

Trailer - Brad Pitt's "Moneyball"

I would like to share the trailer of “Moneyball” which I saw last night and it seems this will be an awesome movie. Based on the book by Michael Lewis (Liar's Poker, The Big Short), Moneyball narrates the story of Billy Beane (played by Brad Pitt) and his efforts towards reshaping the struggling Major League Baseball team. The trailer looks promising and Brad Pitt’s performance looks solid. Hope Brad Pitt will make it to the Oscars next year, as along with Moneyball I am predicting Brad’s another movie “The Tree of Life” will be among the top contenders for the next Oscars.

Apple engineer resurrect Antikythera

This is one of the most extraordinary projects I have ever seen which makes use of the LEGO blocks in order to recreate the computer which can accurately predict the time of celestial events such as Solar or Lunar eclipse. Andrew Carol who works with Apple got his inspiration from one of the oldest computers known to mankind. Greeks were behind the invention of this computer (100 BC) which is based on the mechanism known as Antikythera (Eclipse predictor) and was used to calculate the movement of various celestial bodies. There was a time when Greece was on top of many things but today Greece is on the verge of getting bankrupt. Reading the latest on Greek debt crisis here.

Carol’s model uses 1500 LEGO blocks and some pretty geeky math in order to resurrect this masterpiece. Watch the jaw dropping video below to see how it works and if you are someone who would like to explore the math behind this then visit the following link for more details.



In addition to building the Antikythera, Carol’s previous works include Babbage Difference Engine which again got build by using LEGO. Check this link to get the details for Carol’s Babbage Difference Engine.

This is extremely impressive and totally awesome. Now we know what kind of skills are required by someone who would like to work at Apple.

Apple plans to build a UFO in Cupertino

On Monday Steve Jobs introduced the World to the iOS 5, iCloud and OS X LION and on Tuesday he gave a presentation to the Cupertino City Council and explained them what will be the new Apple facility look like. "It a little like a spaceship has landed," he told Cupertino's city council.

Below is the video of the 20 minute presentation which Steve gave to support his thoughts for this awesome new building. You can see Steve’s vision in the form of a UFO shaped building which will be one of its kind. Let’s see what all the concerned authorities have to say about this.

Check out the video. The building looks pretty awesome.

WWDC 2011 - iOS5, iCloud and MAC OS X LION

Right on target and beyond the expectations of most of us Apple and Steve Jobs kicked off the WWDC 2011 with huge fanfare. Apple and Steve today unveiled iOS5, iCloud and Mac OS X Lion. There is this awesome coverage by engadget which I would like to share. Do not waste any time and head straight to the following link.

Hopefully more goodies on the way from Apple as this event is just getting started. Huge Thanks to engadget for publishing the live blog.

"Altly" - An alternative to Facebook

When it comes to entreprenuership Dmitry Shapiro won’t give up that easily. He is an aggressive and exuberant entreprenuer who is still trying hard to make an impression in the tech world. His last 2 startups Veoh (a video-streaming company got eaten by YouTube) and Akonix (instant messaging company got acquired by Quest) were not able to sustain long. Dmitry joined MySpace Music and its CTO and it seems now he has left that job as well. He is recently is news for his latest venture which is called “Altly”.

I got the chance to visit the site of Altly and I came to know that this time Dmitry is planning something big. Something which most of the tech gurus wanted to do for a long time now but does not have the courage to pull it off. So what exactly is Altly all about? Well the sole purpose of Altly is to make something better and bigger than Facebook. You read it right, Dimitry is all set to challenge Facebook and now the fight is out there in the open. This has been an interesting development as far as the competition with Facebook is concerned.

This is not for the first time that someone is trying to take on Facebook. Diaspora which attempted to do the same is out there but slowly and gradually it is on the verge of losing out to Facebook. Will Altly be able to compete with Facebook? Well it is all upto to Dimitry and his team which is working very hard in order to make that happen. The team at Altly even convinced some investors and it seems they have raised around $1 million for this venture. Dimitry wrote a very convincing and descriptive blog on the site of Altly explaining why we need Altly and how this social networking site will challenge Facebook and overcome someone of the shady features of the social giant. It is very interesting to know that someone like Dimitry is damn serious in shaking the pillars of Facebook.

There is one very intersting point which Dimitry made in his blog while explaining the reason why we need an alternative to Facebook and to me this sounds convincing enough.
"There are NO serious alternatives at this time. For every Coke there is a Pepsi, for every Ford there is a Chevy, for every PC there is a Mac and for every Facebook there is…. a void! Facebook has such overwhelming power that practically no one believes that trying to build an alternative is possible."

Well good luck to Altly and Dimitry. Competition is always good and it seems Facebook needs that if it wants to enhance and reshape its social networking business model.

In search of Qi Lu

I am keeping my promise which I have made earlier in one of my blogs that I will write about the things that makes Qi Lu so inspiring and productive beyond imagination. Qi Lu holds the position of the president of the online service division at Microsoft and he is the mastermind behind Bing (Microsoft’s search engine). So far Bing has been impressive and I can say it is currently the only search engine which can challenge Google. So far Bing has not done much damage to Google but it is trying very hard. Qi Lu on the other hand is Microsoft’s warrior who is leading the company’s war to gain as much as possible in the search market. Interestingly as one of the analysts said that with the kind of discipline and intellectual power Lu brings along with him he can be the one who can surely convert the pebble into the boulder.

Who is Qi Lu and what makes him indefatigable? (Select the best possible answer)

A. Lu was born in China and spend his childhood with his grand parents in the Jiangsu province which is like 5 hours away from Shanghai. Life in China was tough and Lu grew up in a very challenging environment with no electricity or running water. In one of the interviews Lu told that eating meat once in a year was considered to be a luxury. Lu completed his bachelors and masters degree in Computer Science from Fudan University in China and was teaching in the same university for a montly salary of $10.

B. One fateful weekend Lu was not able to leave the University due to the severe rainstorm and was in the dorm room when one of his colleagues requested him to attend the talk by Carnegie Mellon professor Edmund M. Clark. Lu asked some very brilliant questions during the session and Mr. Clark suggested Lu to come to the US in order to pursue a PhD from Carnegie Mellon. Post PhD Lu joined IBM as a research staff member at IBM's Almaden Research Center and after that he joined Yahoo. In Yahoo Lu lead the team of 3,000 engineers and became one of the primary person to run the search business for Yahoo.

C. Lu possess relentless work habits and according to some of his colleagues his body is not wired like you and me. Six days in a week he gets up at 3:00 am and run 4-5 miles. According to Lu running charged his batteries, as he work each day as late as 10:00 pm. He divide his work day into smaller chunks which he call ‘Qi time’ and he used that time to master various subjects that interests him. Qi Lu holds 20 US patents.

D. Lu somehow lost the faith in Yahoo and its ability to invest billions of dollars in setting up an infrastructure which is required to run and excel in the search business and because of such reasons he left Yahoo. Even on his last day at Yahoo, Lu was working till 12:00 am till his account was locked by the HR. Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer has full faith in Lu and his ability to make Bing robust and a widely accepted search engine. According to Ballmer - "Qi is the absolutely best guy on the planet to run a search business."

E. All of the above

Well according to me `E` is the correct answer and I am sure you all will agree with me on this. After reading the story of Qi Lu I reached a conclusion that there are many more Qi Lu in this World, some are waiting for the right chance, some are waiting to be found and some are waiting for that rainstorm which can change their life forever so that in turn they can change the lives of you and me and bring some drastic positive changes to this World. Keep searching….

For entreprenuers - Age no bar

I just came across this awesome article for people who would like to become entreprenuers but are having certain doubts about their age. According to me there is absolutely no relationship between age and entreprenuership. I have made this point earlier in my blog and you can check it here. Age is certainly not the criteria when it comes to setting up your own company. It is good to know that my thoughts are getting resonated and there are many more people out there who believe the same thing.

So if you are someone who are in his or her 30s/40s or whatever your age might be, don’t let the stories of the founders of Microsoft or Google or Facebook stop you from opening your own company just because the founders of these very successful organizations started their own venture when they were just in their 20s.

To recapitulate and today I will say this louder than ever before – “Age no bar”. Forget about your age and the things people have been telling you about that. You are not competing with Google or Facebook, at the end of the day your are competing against yourself and it is you and only you who can fulfill your dream to run and nurture your own company. That is the fact which is also the most important part of our lives. Period.

iCloud, iOS 5 & Mac OS X (Lion)

According to the press release from Apple which can be found here, the company is all set to release iCloud, iOS5 and much awaited Mac OS X (Lion)during its WWDC 2011 conference which is all set to start on June 6th. Moreover to the excitement of everybody Steve Jobs will be there to deliver the key notes. Hopefully I will be able to blog about the proceedings. Positive change in the shares of Apple (AAPL) after a long time, hope it remains the same way.

Google Wallet & Google Offers

Yesterday in NYC Google launched two amazing services - Google Wallet and Google Offers. Google Offers is nothing but Google’s reply to Groupon. To know more about Groupon visit its wiki page or my blog which I wrote sometime back.

Google Wallet is pretty interesting as it is something which will make your credit card, disappear. NFC or Near Field Communication is the underlying technology on which Google Wallet works. I blogged about NFC and its applications about three months back and if you want to refresh your memory then check that blog here. Sprint, Citi and Mastercard are the primary partners along with Google in the launch of this service. Google Wallet will be compatible with Google’s Nexus S 4G Android phone and slowly and gradually will be available on other devices as well. Security is one thing on which Google is working pretty hard and it seems First Data (Trusted services manager) will be working with Google in order to make Google Wallet impenetrable. ‘NXP PN65’ chip which was part of the Nexus S 4G will be useful in making the transactions more secure and will provide multiple security levels. This chip has got a lot of protections built into it like tamper sensors and protection from laser attacks. The chip will only tuned ON when using the Google Wallet else the chip will just sit in the hardware layer quietly.

Google is planning to officially release Google Wallet in San Francisco and NYC this summer and slowly will make the service available in other major cities as well. As per the team from Google, global launch of this service is near and Google will soon provide the update on that as well. Over 100,000 merchants ready for Google Wallet today and some of the major names include, Macy's, Subway, Walgreens & Toys 'R Us.

According to Google, Google Wallet will eventually replace your wallet but that will take some time as you have no other options but to use plastic in case you lost your phone or your phone battery is dead. The technology looks promising and I am sure this will be implemented big time in the coming phones including iPhone, the only thing to worry about at this point is the security which we all know can be compromised any level.

Perfect day to be an Entrepreneur

I keep on telling this time and again and today I will emphasize on this fact and recapitulate that this is the perfect time for anyone with a great idea to be an entrepreneur. Promiscuous startups and the ideas conceived by these talented minds are getting the complete undivided attention of the VC community and the media. Various factors indicates and promotes the fact that this is a very good day to be an entrepreneur.

Just yesterday I came to know about this news that Facebook investor and board member Peter Thiel has announced 24 under 20 fellowships to bright and talented individuals to pursue their dream of opening their own company. Each of these winners will get $100,000, provided they leave the school and devote their full time attention in nurturing their startups. Businessweek has done a good job in writing this article, which I guess is a must read if you are crazy about doing something on the same lines.

There is another fascinating article for budding entreprenuers by Steven Levy (the author of the latest book ‘In the Plex’, which narrates the proceedings inside the walls of Googleplex) which got published in the wired magazine. The narration of this article is totally amazing and it is a very interesting read. Steven Levy explores the campus of Y-Combinator or YC (the seed stage startup funding firm) and how it is shaping the future of startups and their creators. You will be introduced to all the basic procedures and processes at YC. The article provides the details right from the interview stage to getting selected by YC partners, to making the final pitch (presentation & demo of your product) in front of hundreds of prominent silicon valley VCs. This article is the best resource if you want to know the inside out of what awaits you at the YC selection event and what happens if you and your team are lucky enough to get through. Also you will come to know what new entrepreneurs go through during this 13 week gruelling excersise on the campus of YC.

YC holds these competitions twice a year and this is an international event, meaning you are welcome to apply if you are outside US and are ready to spend 13 weeks with YC (this article does mention the names of some international founders). So if you have missed the winter session then there is one coming up right in the summer and you can get the details for the same here.

Put on your thinking caps and get ready to change the world. You better hurry as millions of promising ideas are floating around and we all know how fast the market saturates. Not in this case I assume, coz I believe that a great idea will always find its place to the top and has got the potential to touch the lives of many and will surely change them forever.

Good Luck !!

Spotify - why we are still waiting...?

If you have’nt heard about Daniel Ek or his super cool creation Spotify then there is no need to be ashamed of and believe me it is not your fault. But if you are among the millions of users who are currently using Spotify then by all means we here in the US are jealous of you guys and you can skip this blog and can go back to enjoy Spotify.

Spotify is the streaming music service which is currently available in certain European countries like Finland, France, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden, and the UK. Based in Sweden, Spotify was started by Daniel Ek in year 2008 and since then it has become one of the hottest music streaming companies. Unfortunately it will take sometime for Spotify to came to the US and the primary reason for that will be the tie up procedure that Spotify has to go through in order to sign the contract with major music companies and their affiliates.

Spotify has got pretty amazing features. Using Spotify you can sync the music to your Android or iPhone using wi-fi. Another cool feature is the Spotify desktop app which allows you to create a playlist as well as you can cache the songs if you want to listen the songs offline. It seems the streaming library is huge and there are millions of songs to select from. Keeping into consideration the people who are socially active, Spotify allows you to share your playlists with your friends over Twitter or Facebook. Currently Spotify allows you to stream around 3 hours of music per week which is kind of a drawback and I am sure this will change in the future.

If things go well and as per the plan then there has been this speculation that Spotify will be coming to Facebook. Let me remind you that Apple tried to cut the same kind of deal for its iTunes ping with Facebook and the deal never happened. The marriage of Spotify and Facebook can be a game changer but I guess Spotify need to step up in more and more countries and it had to surely come out of the Euro zone if it had to enjoy the social party. “Facebook Music" or "Spotify For Facebook" will be the name for this new app. Watch out for the announcement in couple of weeks.

I know to most of us this updates means nothing but I am sure Spotify is trying hard to make this meaningful to all of us. After all what Netflix is to movies Spotify is to music and now each of these companies want to show the world what there streaming power is capable of and each of them is trying to expand their footprint globally.

Adieu Mark Haines

Well if you are an aggressive CNBC viewer like me or anyone who keeps an eye on the day to day business news you must have came across this sad news that one of the primary CNBC anchor and one of the best business journalist of our times ‘Mark Haines’ has passed away last evening. It is indeed a very sad news as I am used to seeing Mark every morning and my day starts listening to his business commentary and updates.

My condolences with the family of Mark, his friends, his colleagues and to every viewer to whom he was a source of incredible knowledge and abundant information.

May his soul RIP. Mark you will be remembered….

Mango - Microsoft's juicy treat

Today Microsoft introduced the latest offering in its Windows Phone (WP) OS, code named Mango. I wish this could be the comeback of Microsoft but we cannot suggest or comment on this as of now. Mango or WP 7.1 as the World is calling it, seems to be pretty revolutionary. According to Steve Ballmer this new OS will have around 500 new enhancements as compared to the earlier version of WP i.e WP 7.0. There are lots of built in APPs but what gathered my attention and the people who attended the event was this amazing search feature which is embedded in the OS.

Microsoft is trying to compete with Google and to some extent it has achieved some market share as far as search is concerned. Bing the search engine for Microsoft is the hope on which this huge organization depends and now Bing is bringing the magic to the WP. Whatever progress of Bing we have seen in search market and whatever it is able to achieve in this realm is the brain child of one and only one person, the president of the online service division at Microsoft – Qi Lu. There has been this very inspirational story about Qi Lu and how he manages to land this vital postion at Microsoft. I guess that does not suppose to be the part of this blog. The story of Qi Lu (which is very close to my heart) deserves a separate discussion and you will see that in my future blog.

Search is one of the two of the most fascinating features of Mango and I am pretty positive that technology will make substantial amount of progress in that direction. The second interesting feature which cannot go un-noticed is the real time text translation. The OS will recognize the word and at your order will try to translate the word to the language of your choice. If I even try to explain these two features in words I’ll be wasting your time and mine and that is why courtesy engadget there is this amazing demo video which you will enjoy for sure.



One thing that concerned me is the release date of Mango and that it won’t be out till this fall which is like sometime in August. This has been an absolutely very profitable opportunity for Microsoft to encash the power of Mango as Google is trying to fix the Android fragmentation issue and we don’t know when Apple will release the next iOS.

Finally competition in the smartphone market is picking up which is good for all. By the looks of it Mango looks perfect and hope Microsoft will make it more juicy. There has been this thing with Microsoft to release the product and fix it later, which has cost the company millions. Hope Microsoft will change this approach and with the release of Mango change it for good.

Yandex IPO - From Russia with Love

Last week it was LinkedIn and today it is Yandex. That is correct Yandex launced its IPO today and though not as volatile as the debut of LinkedIn but certainly Yandex is generating some buzz among the investors. Yandex is Russia’a answer to Google and it is extremely hot in Russia. The local market share of Yandex is around 65% whereas Google is 22%.

Yandex was co-founded by Russian mathematician and computer whiz Arkady Volozh and and geophysicist Ilya Segalovich. Go to the wiki page of Yandex to learn more about that. The stock which was suppose to open at $25 per share is now trading at around $35. It already touched the $40 mark in the morning but got retreated back in the 30s territory. To get the latest update on the price of Yandex (YNDX) check here.

Hope Yandex is here to stay as the competition in the search market is increasing everyday. Right from the start from Alta Vista to Yahoo to Google to Bing to Yandex many search technologies have seen their best before falling down on their knees. One such search engine of recent times was Cuil which was not able to withstand the competition and now is down for good. Cuil was launced by former Google employees but failed. Hope Yandex will learn from its mistake. I do see some traffic from Yandex on my blog as I have lots of views from the people of Russia and I am very thankful to them for reading my blog.

Hope Yandex won’t disappoint its solid user base and the investors who are pretty bullish on the stock and the company. Some debate that the search algorithm of Yandex is pretty stable and at times superior to that of Google. I say why not, there is a common link between Google and Yandex and that link is Russia (Google’s co-founder Sergey Brin was born in Russia). Well good luck to Yandex and its investors. Tech on boom and fingers crossed as usual.